This I Believe - New England

Wednesday at 6:45 AM, 8:45 AM and 5:45 PM

Modeled on the popular 1950s radio series of the same name hosted by Edward R. Murrow, This I Believe - New England, hosted by Frederic Reamer, is an effort to share the many stories of people of New England... the personal experiences that have helped form the opinions of your neighbors. This I Believe - New England is also an opportunity for you to share your own beliefs and experiences.

We've all been there: Those times when the people we care most about need us badly, perhaps in the face of dreadful news. Of course, the tables sometimes turn, and we need others to provide succor and solace. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, "A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature." But being present in these difficult, sometimes overwhelming moments, isn't always easy. Tears, trauma, and anguish can be hard to bear. Yet sometimes simply being there is all we can offer, and might even be all that's needed, as we hear from Patricia Liberty.

So many of us, perhaps all of us, do our best to cope with the rush of life. The pressures and pace seem relentless, the push to move it, move it, move it! Race to pick up the kids on time! Check those text messages! Get that final draft in by noon! And on and on.

Who among us hasn't carved moments out of our lives to moan . . . and . . . groan. "If that kid of mine doesn't clean her room, I'm going to bust a gut!" "Can you believe the prices on this menu?" "What in heaven's name do I need to do to lose some weight?" Complaining seems to be part of the human condition, what happens between inhaling and exhaling.

For some, studying history conjures up images of dusty documents piled high in the library stacks or a professor's book-filled office. How many of us can recall history courses where we studied fistfuls of flashcards before the exam, doing our best to memorize a litany of dates and what seemed like arcane facts that we quickly forgot?

Have you ever encountered moments in life when you weren't sure you had the wherewithal to climb out of bed and face another day? Moments when you saw no light whatsoever at the end of your tunnel, when you wanted to, well, just give up?

Here we are, right smack in the heart of another New England winter. For some, this stretch of months with early sunsets is filled with dread -- frosty temperatures, snow piles to shovel, and ice patches to dodge. But for others of us, this wintry mix is the stuff of pure delight.

Growing older can be complicated. Some manage to ease into new chapters in their lives with grace and equanimity. Others struggle, perhaps because of ill health, daunting financial challenges, or, perhaps, for more existential reasons having to do with the mysteries and anxieties of mortality.

Many of us have known friends and loved ones whose minds and mental faculties have slipped away as some form of dementia has tightened its unrelenting grip. We know the challenging signs: confusion about time and place, memory lapses, language difficulties, mood changes, isolation. No doubt, this is a painful process for nearly everyone caught in its midst. But some of us also find precious, even bright moments as we travel this complicated journey. Anne Mulhall has found just that and shares the lessons she's learned from her deeply personal odyssey.

Many of us can recall a time when we found ourselves pretty much alone in the world – perhaps after having moved to a new city with neither family nor friends, or to a new country with brand new sights, disorienting customs, and unfamiliar language. These sorts of beginnings can be filled with a complicated mix of excitement, nagging anxiety, alluring challenge, and profound loneliness. Over time, we hope, we find our way, forge a path, and nestle in.

The nineteenth century novelist Joseph Conrad once wrote, “My task, which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see.” And that is exactly what this Rhode Island Public Radio series aims to do. Featured essayists stitch together words that let you peek inside their core beliefs, their struggles to understand their world, their insights about what matters most in life. Sometimes these words are expressed in prose, sometimes in poetry.

It's a truism, isn't it, that every life has its challenges – some big, some small, and the rest in between. Under the best of circumstances, we bump into manageable nuisances that fall far short of life-altering crises – say, coping with a flat tire, forgetting a doctor's appointment, or misplacing our car keys. But, some of us will encounter truly catastrophic circumstances that turn our lives upside down, stop us in our tracks, take our breath away. The sudden death of a loved one. Coming home to a house that burned down. The horrific car accident.

Most of us have discovered that we can be blindsided by life's unpredictable, sometimes unbidden events: the doctor's diagnosis we weren't expecting, or perhaps the stinging message from a spouse or partner letting us know the relationship is over. You know the type of news – the kind no one wants to hear. Yet, sometimes horrific news seems to offer us a meaningful wake-up call, a chance to sort out priorities and put things in perspective.

Sometimes, too often perhaps, it seems impossible to absorb the steady diet of toxic news stories and headlines: mass shootings, deadly hurricanes, horrific droughts, massive wildfires, out-of-control pandemics, and hundred-year floods. For some of us, it may be tempting to keep the news at bay and retreat into our respective cocoons, out of harm's way – or so we would like to believe. But don't all of us yearn to keep hope alive somehow, even in the face of what may seem to be daunting odds?